Джон Голсуорси
To Let
X
TRIO
Among those four Forsytes of the third, and, as one might say, fourth generation, at Wansdon under the Downs, a week-end prolonged unto the ninth day had stretched the crossing threads of tenacity almost to snapping-point. Never had Fleur been so "FINE," Holly so watchful, Val so stable-secretive, Jon so silent and disturbed. What he learned of farming in that week might have been balanced on the point of a pen-knife and puffed off. He, whose nature was essentially averse to intrigue, and whose adoration of Fleur disposed him to think that any need for concealing it was "skittles," chafed and fretted, yet obeyed, taking what relief he could in the few moments when they were alone. On Thursday, while they were standing in the bay window of the drawing-room, dressed for dinner, she said to him:
"Jon, I'm going home on Sunday by the 3.40 from Paddington; if you were to go home on SATURDAY you could come up on Sunday and take me down, and just get back here by the last train, after. You WERE going home anyway, weren't you?"
Jon nodded.
"Anything to be with you," he said; "only why need I pretend – "
Fleur slipped her little finger into his palm:
"You have no instinct, Jon; you MUST leave things to me. It's serious about our people. We've simply got to be secret at present, if we want to be together." The door was opened, and she added loudly: "You ARE a duffer, Jon."
Something turned over within Jon; he could not bear this subterfuge about a feeling so natural, so overwhelming, and so sweet.
On Friday night about eleven he had packed his bag, and was leaning out of his window, half miserable and half lost in a dream of Paddington station, when he heard a tiny sound, as of a finger-nail tapping on his door. He rushed to it and listened. Again the sound. It WAS a nail. He opened. Oh! What a lovely thing came in!
"I wanted to show you my fancy dress," it said, and struck an attitude at the foot of his bed. Jon drew a long breath and leaned against the door. The apparition wore white muslin on its head, a fichu round its bare neck over a wine-coloured dress, fulled out below its slender waist. It held one arm akimbo, and the other raised right-angled holding a fan which touched its head.
"This ought to be a basket of grapes," it whispered, "but I haven't got it here. It's my Goya dress. And this is the attitude in the picture. Do you like it?"
"It's a dream."
The apparition pirouetted. "Touch it, and see."
Jon knelt down and took the skirt reverently.
"Grape colour," came the whisper, "all grapes – La Vendimia – the vintage."
Jon's fingers scarcely touched each side of the waist; he looked up, with adoring eyes.
"Oh! Jon," it whispered; bent, kissed his forehead, pirouetted again, and, – gliding out, was gone.
Jon stayed on his knees, and his head fell forward against the bed. How long he stayed like that he did not know. The little noises of the tapping nail, the feet, the skirts rustling – as in a dream – went on about him; and before his closed eyes the figure stood and smiled and whispered, a faint perfume of narcissus lingering in the air. And his forehead where it had been kissed had a little cool place between the brows, like the imprint of a flower. Love filled his soul, that love of boy for girl which knows so little, hopes so much, would not brush the down off for the world, and must become in time a fragrant memory – a searing passion – a humdrum mateship – or, once in many times, vintage full and sweet with sunset colour on the grapes.
Enough has been said about Jon Forsyte here and in another place to show what long marches lay between him and his great-great-grandfather, the first Jolyon, in Dorset down by the sea. Jon was sensitive as a girl, more sensitive than nine out of ten girls of the day; imaginative as one of his half-sister June's "lame duck" painters; affectionate as a son of his father and his mother naturally would be. And yet, in his inner tissue, there was something of the old founder of his family, a secret tenacity of soul, a dread of showing his feelings, a determination not to know when he was beaten. Sensitive, imaginative, affectionate boys get a bad time at school, but Jon had instinctively kept his nature dark, and been but normally unhappy there. Only with his mother had he, up till then, been absolutely frank and natural; and when he went home to Robin Hill that Saturday his heart was heavy because Fleur had said that he must not be frank and natural with her from whom he had never yet kept anything, must not even tell her that they had met again, unless he found that she knew already. So intolerable did this seem to him that he was very near to telegraphing an excuse and staying up in London. And the first thing his mother said to him was:
"So you've had our little friend of the confectioner's there, Jon. What is she like on second thoughts?"
With relief, and a high colour, Jon answered:
"Oh! awfully jolly, Mum."
Her arm pressed his.
Jon had never loved her so much as in that minute which seemed to falsify Fleur's fears and to release his soul. He turned to look at her, but something in her smiling face – something which only he perhaps would have caught – stopped the words bubbling up in him. Could fear go with a smile? If so, there was fear in her face. And out of Jon tumbled quite other words, about farming, Holly, and the Downs. Talking fast, he waited for her to come back to Fleur. But she did not. Nor did his father mention her, though of course he, too, must know. What deprivation, and killing of reality was in this silence about Fleur – when he was so full of her, when his mother was so full of Jon, and his father so full of his mother! And so the trio spent the evening of that Saturday.
After dinner his mother played; she seemed to play all the things he liked best, and he sat with one knee clasped, and his hair standing up where his fingers had run through it. He gazed at his mother while she played, but he saw Fleur – Fleur in the moonlit orchard, Fleur in the sunlit gravel-pit, Fleur in that fancy dress, swaying, whispering, stooping, kissing his forehead. Once, while he listened, he forgot himself and glanced at his father in that other easy chair. What was Dad looking like that for? The expression on his face was so sad and puzzling. It filled him with a sort of remorse, so that he got up and went and sat on the arm of his father's chair. From there he could not see his face; and again he saw Fleur – in his mother's hands, slim and white on the keys, in the profile of her face and her powdery hair; and down the long room in the open window where the May night walked outside.
When he went up to bed his mother came into his room. She stood at the window, and said:
"Those cypresses your grandfather planted down there have done wonderfully. I always think they look beautiful under a dropping moon. I wish you had known your grandfather, Jon."
"Were you married to Father, when he was alive?" asked Jon suddenly.
"No, dear; he died in '92 – very old – eighty-five, I think."
"Is Father like him?"
"A little, but more subtle, and not quite so solid."
"I know, from Grandfather's portrait; who painted that?"
"One of June's 'lame ducks.' But it's quite good."
Jon slipped his hand through his Mother's arm. "Tell me about the family quarrel, Mum."
He felt her arm quivering. "No, dear; that's for your father some day, if he thinks fit."
"Then it WAS serious," said Jon, with a catch in his breath.
"Yes." And there was a silence, during which neither knew whether the arm or the hand within it were quivering most.
"Some people," said Irene softly, "think the moon on her back is evil; to me she's always lovely. Look at those cypress shadows! Jon, Father says we may go to Italy, you and I, for two months. Would you like?"
Jon took his hand from under her arm; his sensation was so sharp and so confused. Italy with his Mother! A fortnight ago it would have been perfection; now it filled him with dismay; he felt that the sudden suggestion had to do with Fleur. He stammered out:
"Oh! yes; only – I don't know. Ought I – now I've just begun? I'd like to think it over."
Her voice answered, cool and gentle:
"Yes, dear; think it over. But better now than when you've begun farming seriously. Italy with you – ! It would be nice!"
Jon put his arm round her waist, still slim and firm as a girl's.
"Do you think you ought to leave Father?" he said feebly, feeling very mean.
"Father suggested it; he thinks you ought to see Italy at least before you settle down to anything."
The sense of meanness died in Jon; he knew, yes – he knew – that his father and his mother were not speaking frankly, no more than he himself. They wanted to keep him from Fleur! His heart hardened. And, as if she felt that process going on, his mother said:
"Good-night, darling. Have a good sleep and think it over. But it would be lovely!"
She pressed him to her so quickly that he did not see her face. Jon stood feeling exactly as he used to when he was a naughty little boy; sore because he was not loving, and because he was justified in his own eyes.
But Irene, after she had stood a moment in her own room, passed through the dressing-room between it and her husband's.
"Well?"
"He will think it over, Jolyon."
Watching her lips that wore a little drawn smile, Jolyon said quietly:
"You had better let me tell him, and have done with it. After all, Jon has the instincts of a gentleman. He has only to understand – "
"Only! He can't understand; that's impossible."
"I believe I could have at his age."
Irene caught his hand. "You were always more of a realist than Jon; and never so innocent."
"That's true," said Jolyon. "It's queer, isn't it? You and I would tell our stories to the world without a particle of shame; but our own boy stumps us."
"We've never cared whether the world approves or not."
"Jon would not disapprove of US!"
"Oh! Jolyon, yes. He's in love, I feel he's in love. And he'd say: 'My mother once married WITHOUT LOVE! How could she have!' It'll seem to him a crime! And so it was!"
Jolyon took her hand, and said with a wry smile:
"Ah! why on earth are we born young? Now, if only we were born old and grew younger year by year we should understand how things happen, and drop all our cursed intolerance. But you know if the boy is really in love, he won't forget, even if he goes to Italy. We're a tenacious breed; and he'll know by instinct why he's being sent. Nothing will really cure him but the shock of being told."
"Let me try, anyway."
Jolyon stood a moment without speaking. Between this devil and this deep sea – the pain of a dreaded disclosure and the grief of losing his wife for two months – he secretly hoped for the devil; yet if she wished for the deep sea he must put up with it. After all, it would be training for that departure from which there would be no return. And, taking her in his arms, he kissed her eyes, and said:
"As you will, my love."
XI
DUET
That "small" emotion, love, grows amazingly when threatened with extinction. Jon reached Paddington station half an hour before his time and a full week after, as it seemed to him. He stood at the appointed book-stall amid a crowd of Sunday travellers, in a Harris tweed suit exhaling, as it were, the emotion of his thumping heart. He read the names of the novels on the bookstall, and bought one at last, to avoid being regarded with suspicion by the book-stall clerk. It was called "The Heart of the Trail" which must mean something, though it did not seem to. He also bought "The Lady's Mirror" and "The Landsman." Every minute was an hour long, and full of horrid imaginings. After nineteen had passed, he saw her with a bag and a porter wheeling her luggage. She came swiftly; she came cool. She greeted him as if he were a brother.
"First class," she said to the porter, "corner seats; opposite."
Jon admired her frightful self-possession.
"Can't we get a carriage to ourselves?" he whispered.
"No good; it's a stopping train. After Maidenhead perhaps. Look natural, Jon."
Jon screwed his features into a scowl. They got in – with two other beasts! – oh! heaven! He tipped the porter unnaturally, in his confusion. The brute deserved nothing for putting them in there, and looking as if he knew all about it into the bargain.
Fleur hid herself behind "The Lady's Mirror." Jon imitated her behind "The Landsman." The train started. Fleur let "The Lady's Mirror" fall and leaned forward. "Well?" she said.
"It's seemed about fifteen days."
She nodded, and Jon's face lighted up at once.
"Look natural," murmured Fleur, and went off into a bubble of laughter. It hurt him. How could he look natural with Italy hanging over him? He had meant to break it to her gently, but now he blurted it out.
"They want me to go to Italy with Mother for two months."
Fleur drooped her eyelids; turned a little pale, and bit her lips.
"Oh!" she said. It was all, but it was much.
That "Oh!" was like the quick drawback of the wrist in fencing ready for riposte. It came.
"You must go!"
"Go?" said Jon in a strangled voice.
"Of course."
"But – two months – it's ghastly."
"No," said Fleur, "six weeks. You'll have forgotten me by then. We'll meet in the National Gallery the day after you get back."
Jon laughed.
"But suppose you've forgotten ME," he muttered into the noise of the train.
Fleur shook her head.
"Some other beast – " murmured Jon.
Her foot touched his.
"No other beast," she said, lifting the "Lady's Mirror."
The train stopped; two passengers got out, and one got in.
'I shall die,' thought Jon, 'if we're not alone at all.'
The train went on; and again Fleur leaned forward.
"I never let go," she said; "do you?"
Jon shook his head vehemently.
"Never!" he said. "Will you write to me?"
"No; but YOU can – to my club."
She had a Club; she was wonderful!
"Did you pump Holly?" he muttered.
"Yes, but got nothing. I didn't dare pump hard."
"What can it be?" cried Jon.
"I shall find out all right."
A long silence followed till Fleur said: "This is Maidenhead, stand by, Jon!"
The train stopped. The remaining passenger got out. Fleur drew down her blind.
"Quick!" she cried. "Hang out! Look as much of a beast as you can."
Jon blew his nose, and scowled; never in all his life had he scowled like that! An old lady recoiled, a young one tried the handle. It turned, but the lock would not open. The train moved, the young lady darted to another carriage.
"What luck!" cried Jon. "It jammed."
"Yes," said Fleur; "I was holding it."
The train moved out, and Jon fell on his knees.
"Look out for the corridor," she whispered; "and – quick!"
Her lips met his. And though their kiss only lasted perhaps ten seconds Jon's soul left his body and went so far beyond that, when he was again sitting opposite that demure figure, he was pale as death. He heard her sigh, and the sound seemed to him the most precious he had ever heard – an exquisite declaration that he meant something to her.
"Six weeks isn't really long," she said; "and you can easily make it six if you keep your head out there, and never seem to think of me."
Jon gasped.
"This is just what's really wanted, Jon, to convince them, don't you see? If we're just as bad when you come back they'll stop being ridiculous about it. Only, I'm sorry it's not Spain; there's a girl in a Goya picture at Madrid who's like me, Father says. Only she isn't – we've got a copy of her."
It was to Jon like a ray of sunshine piercing through a fog. "I'll make it Spain," he said, "Mother won't mind; she's never been there. And my father thinks a lot of Goya."
"Oh! yes, he's a painter – isn't he?"
"Only water-colour," said Jon, with honesty.
"When we come to Reading, Jon, get out first and go down to Caversham lock and wait for me. I'll send the car home and we'll walk by the towing-path."
Jon seized her hand in gratitude, and they sat silent, with the world well lost, and one eye on the corridor. But the train seemed to run twice as fast now, and its sound was almost lost in that of Jon's sighing.
"We're getting near," said Fleur; "the towing-path's awfully exposed. One more! Oh! Jon, don't forget me."
Jon answered with his kiss. And very soon, a flushed, distracted-looking youth could have been seen – as they say – leaping from the train and hurrying along the platform, searching his pockets for his ticket.
When at last she rejoined him on the towing-path a little beyond Caversham lock he had made an effort, and regained some measure of equanimity. If they had to part, he would not make a scene! A breeze by the bright river threw the white side of the willow leaves up into the sunlight, and followed those two with its faint rustle.
"I told our chauffeur that I was train-giddy," said Fleur. "Did you look pretty natural as you went out?" "I don't know. What is natural?"
"It's natural to you to look seriously happy. When I first saw you I thought you weren't a bit like other people."
"Exactly what I thought when I saw you. I knew at once I should never love anybody else."
Fleur laughed.
"We're absurdly young. And love's young dream is out of date, Jon. Besides, it's awfully wasteful. Think of all the fun you might have. You haven't begun, even; it's a shame, really. And there's me. I wonder!"
Confusion came on Jon's spirit. How could she say such things just as they were going to part?
"If you feel like that," he said, "I can't go. I shall tell Mother that I ought to try and work. There's always the condition of the world!"
"The condition of the world!"
Jon thrust his hands deep into his pockets.
"But there is," he said; "think of the people starving!"
Fleur shook her head. "No, no, I never, never will make myself miserable for nothing."
"Nothing! But there's an awful state of things, and of course one ought to help."
"Oh! yes, I know all that. But you can't help people, Jon; they're hopeless. When you pull them out of a hole they only get into another. Look at them, still fighting and plotting and struggling, though they're dying in heaps all the time. Idiots!"
"Aren't you sorry for them?"
"Oh! sorry – yes, but I'm not going to make myself unhappy about it; that's no good."
And they were silent, disturbed by this first glimpse of each other's natures.
"I think people are brutes and idiots," said Fleur stubbornly.
"I think they're poor wretches," said Jon. It was as if they had quarrelled – and at this supreme and awful moment, with parting visible out there in that last gap of the willows!
"Well, go and help your poor wretches, and don't think of me."
Jon stood still. Sweat broke out on his forehead, and his limbs trembled. Fleur too had stopped, and was frowning at the river.
"I MUST believe in things," said Jon with a sort of agony; "we're all meant to enjoy life."
Fleur laughed: "Yes; and that's what you won't do, if you don't take care. But perhaps your idea of enjoyment is to make yourself wretched. There are lots of people like that, of course."
She was pale, her eyes had darkened, her lips had thinned. Was it Fleur thus staring at the water? Jon had an unreal feeling as if he were passing through the scene in a book where the lover has to choose between love and duty. But just then she looked round at him. Never was anything so intoxicating as that vivacious look. It acted on him exactly as the tug of a chain acts on a dog – brought him up to her with his tail wagging and his tongue out.
"Don't let's be silly," she said, "time's too short. Look, Jon, you can just see where I've got to cross the river. There, round the bend, where the woods begin."
Jon saw a gable, a chimney or two, a patch of wall through the trees – and felt his heart sink.
"I mustn't dawdle any more. It's no good going beyond the next hedge, it gets all open. Let's get on to it and say good-bye."
They went side by side, hand in hand, silently towards the hedge, where the mayflower, both pink and white, was in full bloom.
"My Club's the 'Talisman,' Stratton Street, Piccadilly. Letters there will be quite safe, and I'm almost always up once a week."
Jon nodded. His face had become extremely set, his eyes stared straight before him.
"To-day's the twenty-third of May," said Fleur; "on the ninth of July I shall be in front of the 'Bacchus and Ariadne' at three o'clock; will you?"
"I will."
"If you feel as bad as I it's all right. Let those people pass!"
A man and woman airing their children went by strung out in Sunday fashion.
The last of them passed the wicket gate.
"Domesticity!" said Fleur, and blotted herself against the hawthorn hedge. The blossom sprayed out above her head, and one pink cluster brushed her cheek. Jon put up his hand jealously to keep it off.
"Good-bye, Jon!" For a second they stood with hands hard clasped. Then their lips met for the third time, and when they parted Fleur broke away and fled through the wicket gate. Jon stood where she had left him, with his forehead against that pink cluster. Gone! For an eternity – for seven weeks all but two days! And here he was, wasting the last sight of her! He rushed to the gate. She was walking swiftly on the heels of the straggling children. She turned her head, he saw her hand make a little flitting gesture; then she sped on, and the trailing family blotted her out from his view.
The words of a comic song —
"Paddington groan – worst ever known —
He gave a sepulchral Paddington groan – "
came into his head, and he sped incontinently back to Reading station. All the way up to London and down to Wansdon he sat with "The Heart of the Trail" open on his knee, knitting in his head a poem so full of feeling that it would not rhyme.